ohle
Train Attendant
- Joined
- Aug 29, 2015
- Messages
- 65
The Rail Passengers Association today issued a paper blasting Amtrak's faulty accounting, which it claims unfairly places more costs on the long-distance trains than they are responsible for.
RPA calls Amtrak’s route accounting system "catastrophically flawed" and contends it "grossly misrepresents – and exaggerates – the public cost of providing passenger trains as a mobility choice for the entire nation."
https://www.railpassengers.org/happening-now/news/releases/amtraks-route-accounting-fatally-flawed-misleading-wrong/
https://www.railpassengers.org/site/assets/files/7353/amtraks_route_accounting_-_fatally_flawed.pdf
Excerpt:
Take this inconsistency:
RPA calls Amtrak’s route accounting system "catastrophically flawed" and contends it "grossly misrepresents – and exaggerates – the public cost of providing passenger trains as a mobility choice for the entire nation."
https://www.railpassengers.org/happening-now/news/releases/amtraks-route-accounting-fatally-flawed-misleading-wrong/
https://www.railpassengers.org/site/assets/files/7353/amtraks_route_accounting_-_fatally_flawed.pdf
Excerpt:
The report is long, but full of valuable information.The Rail Passengers Association (RPA) strongly believes that the ongoing debate concerning the future shape of Amtrak's national network has been distorted by its use of fully allocated costs rather than avoidable costs as required by statute. The adverse outcome of using fully allocated costs is the widespread and incorrect perception that Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor is financially self-sufficient and that Amtrak’s need for taxpayer funding results entirely from its operation of passenger trains in the rest of the nation – the National Network, which consists of state supported regional and federally supported long distance routes.
In our companion White Paper, RPA explains why fully allocated costing combined with Amtrak’s catastrophically flawed route accounting system grossly misrepresents – and exaggerates – the public cost of providing passenger trains as a mobility choice for the entire nation.
Faulty route accounting has, in turn, led to the popular misconception that the abandonment of long-distance trains will eliminate Amtrak’s need for taxpayer funding. Nothing could be further from the truth.
The funding needed for the Northeast Corridor dwarfs that of what’s needed for the rest of the nation. RPA’s white paper explains the history of Amtrak’s route accounting methodology and demonstrates that if Amtrak applied the more economically sound avoidable costing methodology to assess the performance of its various routes, Amtrak’s leadership team would not be working to replace the current national network with disconnected groups of short distance regional trains serving only a small number of major metropolitan areas.
The Rail Passengers Association asks Congress to require Amtrak immediately to halt all route, schedule and frequency reductions as well as recent on-board service modifications; then require Amtrak’s leadership team to explain to, and gain the approval of, the Congress, the states and stakeholders of its vision of the passenger train system and service they envision for the future. Cover, concealment and stealth tactics are appropriate for a military operation but not for a Government Sponsored Enterprise whose purpose is to provide passenger train service to the nation.
Take this inconsistency:
APT (Amtrak Performance Tracking) reported the same wide variation in the cost allocations of Yard & Equipment Moves to trains that
originate and terminate in Chicago. For long distance routes, the cost varied considerably and inexplicably:
The City of New Orleans was just under $200,000, The Capitol Limited just over $200,000, The Texas Eagle just over $300,000, The Southwest Chief just over $400,000, The Empire Builder over $1.6 million and the California Zephyr nearly $1.8 million. If there is a reason for such wide variation, it is not obvious. The more likely explanation is that APT’s allocation rules do not reflect actual costs.
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